By Richard M. Sherwin…

Nearly a quarter century ago, Apple Corp. created an anti IBM TV ad that inferred that consumers who purchased IBM compatible PCs were lemmings that would fall off the world chasing each other.

Now who’s laughing? Despite its $15 billion in sales on what I believe is not even the third best product in PCs, MP3 players and Smart Phones, you have millions of customers following each other like lemmings buying Apple’s products despite getting slapped in the face by the manufacturer.

Can you imagine spending $600 or on a TV and have Sony say you need to buy a patch so that you can use it? Can you imagine Sony’s chief treating you like you were a meaningless chronic complainer about the TV’s defect and first wanting to charge you to fix the problem? In fact, an analysis by AT@T itself allegedly says that amongst its Smart Phones and other higher end mobile phones, the IPhone has consistently had the worst factory defect and repair record of any brand in their stores! Is that why there are SO many refurbished IPhone models for sale on its web site? Is that why the warrantee-guarantee on Apple phones in general and IPods and the new IPad have the weakest backing by its manufacturer in the business?

Another secret report from inside Verizon says that Apple’s shoddy manufacturing, along with its reputation for unresponsive help desk is one of the reasons why the big Telco hasn’t exactly leaped like another lemmings into Apple’s claws.

And, ironically, Consumer Reports, which gave the IPhone 4 an unacceptable rating , was trashed by some IPhone lovers for unfairly picking on Apple, has actually been in my opinion butt boy over the years, not accurately telling consumers about other Apple product issues.

• Have you noticed how many of the top Blue Ray players and HDTVs owners out there have trouble when using HDMI cables instead of component cables with their set top boxes? Very reliable sources at both Verizon FIOS and Cablevision are saying that the cable box makers, TV makers and content providers have really never agreed on a standard for the High Definition Multimedia Interface face cables. That’s why consumer complaints about poor digital signals, dropped audio feeds and downright no content coming from a Blue Ray player or TV are spreading. Time Warner cable has even stopped giving out free HDMI cables with their Samsung set top boxes. And while HDMI cables do eliminate five cables from the spaghetti behind your TV set, they actually DON’T provide better video or audio reception.
• Some computer editing aficionados I know always make fun of me for doing some basic editing of my family’s digital photos and videos with free or low priced software. I finally moved up to Adobe’s Elements Premier and voila! it really is easy to tuen into a pro editor of home video and phones. Two years ago, when I tried it (there’s still a free trial available at www.adobe.com), the loading time to install or run it was just unacceptable and the tech support was as confusing as the product. Now, with Version 8, they’ve solved many of the issue that made it consumer unfriendly at any price and its $79 or less price at the Costco’s, BJ’s and even some Walmarts, make it a really good buy for anyone wanting to have some really powerful editing tools for family or even small business projects.
• So Intel Corp., Sony and Logitech are gearing up for the next generation TVs dubbed Smart TVs. These new TVs, out probably this fall, will have built-in access to your Internet content…way more content and interactivity than what you can get now from Sony, Panasonic, Visio, Sharp, and LG. And those of you stuck with a $1,000 older model HDTV, you can purchase a $250 adapter that will add these computer functions to your present TV. Early indications are that the features provided by Smart TV are a slightly more confusing version of what you can get from TiVo Series Three and Vudu. Ironically, Apple TV II, another one of the not so reported failures of Apple, is also trying to make us use our TV as computers and vice versa. Interestingly enough, I wonder if Intel Corp., the driving force behind Smart TV, already dubbed by industry wags as Intel Inside TV, understands that TiVo and VuDu report very little usage of their computer content from their customers.
• Good News-Bad News for Microsoft. As Windows 7 has become a terrific operating system, the Redmond, Washington behemoth also gets kudus for improving its customer and tech support for its OS and for its other software programs, too. I had a few problems with the new Office 2010 and a call to technical support fixed the issue and gave me some pointers about Windows 7 voluntarily in about 5 minutes without the usual request for mother’s maiden name and next of kin.

However, recently because of many complaints that Microsoft’s Zune, its underrated multimedia player’s new software was troublesome to use with no real drag and drop way to add to your music collection like even the cheapest MP3 players, no less the vaunted Apple ITunes and also sometimes accidentally deleting customer’s legally purchased digital music library, the company made things worse by overhauling the Zune software and making it harder to use AND not taking care of the original problem. So this time Apple fans have a good reason to gloat.